


The Man in the Mirror

by tryslora



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Community: fullmoon_ficlet, FTM Stiles, Gen, Reflection, Sacrifice, Transgender, body issues, canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-25
Updated: 2013-03-25
Packaged: 2017-12-06 10:06:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/734453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tryslora/pseuds/tryslora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Stiles looks in the mirror, he sees his mother’s sacrifice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Man in the Mirror

**Author's Note:**

> I have another story in my WiP folder where Stiles is FTM, but this one bubbled up as soon as I saw the prompt for this week. Thankfully I made notes so I didn't forget to write it, because it really wanted to be written. Also, yes, I have a thing about writing Stiles's mother sacrificing herself. It seems to be a theme for me.
> 
> This was originally written for Prompt #10 - Reflection at fullmoon_ficlet on Livejournal. I don't own the characters or world of Teen Wolf, but I do love to play with them.

When Stiles looks in the mirror, he sees who he used to be.

He sees the delicate features, the small boned frame. He sees narrow hips and skin stretched over lanky bones that have yet to hit their adolescent growth.

He sees a gap-toothed smile.

He sees hair curling long around his ears, teasing at the nape of his neck.

Sometimes he hears his mother’s voice in the background, calling his name. Not Stiles—that started just before she died. His _given_ name. The one he heard for ten years of his life before everything changed.

#

When Stiles looks in the mirror, he sees his memories.

He sees himself curled in the rocking chair across his mother’s lap, tears coursing over his cheeks, struggling to put into words what had happened at school. She was patient with him, waiting calmly until he gulped in air and managed to stop the sobs.

They had told him he was a _girl_.

He had insisted that he wasn’t, not really, and that when he grew up, while they were all getting boobs and periods, he’d get his penis finally and be like all the other boys. He’d have broad shoulders like Janie’s brother, and he’d be good at basketball like Sylvie’s brother. He wasn’t going to be _soft_. And he was never, ever going to bleed.

But they had sat there, all of the ones who were listed as _girls_ , and the teacher had said _Regina Sheffield Stilinski, you will stay in your seat_ when Stiles had tried to leave.

His mother understood, though. She said she’d make sure they understood as well. She’d set things right.

#

When Stiles looks in the mirror, he sees blood on his hands.

His mother promised that she would make everything right, but they had to wait. They had to wait until the first time Stiles bled, because that blood would be sacrifice. Would be magical.

Stiles screamed when it happened. Even though he _knew_ , academically, that it was supposed to come, he was too young, too small, and too _male_ for it to be true. The blood stained his Superman underpants with bright red drops just seven months after his tenth birthday, and he sat there, staring at it in disbelief.

He tried to tell himself that it was good. He hadn’t started to _develop_ yet (boobs, oh God, he didn’t want boobs, even though Merry was so proud of the one she’d started to get). He was still stick thin and rangy, his arms and legs too long for his body.

But he was _bleeding_.

He screamed again and his mother came running, using the old hairpin she kept to jimmy the bathroom lock from when Stiles was a toddler and used to lock himself in all the time. Stiles looked at her, helpless, blood on his hands from accidentally touching himself _there._ Tears leaked from his eyes.

_Is it time_?

She folded her hands around his and nodded. It was time.

He doesn’t remember now what she said, nor what she did, only that he slept like the dead for twenty hours straight, and when he woke he had a penis and his mother was in the hospital.

#

When Stiles looks in the mirror, he sees his mother’s face staring back.

He has her bone structure. If he lets his hair grow too long, it curls in the same way, gently framing his face. He keeps it buzzed short, maybe an inch or two at the most when it grows out.

Even when she was in the hospital, she managed to keep her hair. Now that he’s older, Stiles is sure it must have been a wig. The cancer required chemo, and the chemo must have made her hair fall out. It always does.

His dad never knew where the cancer came from. All he knew was that his wife went from healthy to months-to-live within the space of a day. It riddled her body, eating her from the inside out.

They tried to save her. Stiles prayed for anything that could work.

But he couldn’t give back what she had done, no matter how much he hated the cost.

She only spoke of it when they were alone; his father didn’t remember. His father thought that Stiles had been named after a favorite uncle who had in turn been named by an eccentric maiden aunt who enjoyed giving female names to male children.

_Did you know this would happen?_

She always smiled sadly, touched his hair. His cheek. She hadn’t known, but she wouldn’t have changed a thing. All she wanted was for her son to be happy in his own skin. All she wanted was for her son to be exactly who he was meant to be.

#

When Stiles looks in the mirror, he sees the echoes of the past.

He sees tragedy and death. He sees pain, he sees change, he sees moving to a new school where his name is buried and he was never anyone _but_ Stiles Stilinski.

He sees the boy everyone knows surrounded by the echoes of the body he was born into.

He sees strength and resolution. He sees the boy who runs with wolves. He sees the spark of magic that runs through him like it burned inside his mother. He sees his potential if he tries too hard, and his success if he finds the balance his mother went beyond.

#

When Stiles looks in the mirror, he sees the man he was always meant to be.


End file.
